RIP Bob Hoskins: His 10 Greatest Roles – Page 11 Flipboard 1. Harold Shand - The Long Good Friday (1980) The best British gangster movie of all time featured the inimitable Hoskins in his greatest 2 hours as crime boss Harold Shand and charted the downfall of his London underworld kingdom. His performance featured all the great Bob Hoskins trademarks - a hard man capable of showcasing real emotions, his capability of stealing every scene he's in and of course that irresistible cockney charm. Despite sharing scenes with some of Britain's best character actors, including Dame Helen Mirren, this is rightly Hoskins' movie. He deals with every bomb, every death and every betrayal with a quiet grace and acceptance that wouldn't be as successful in anyone else's hands. Everything exceptional about the role is distilled in the final five minutes where Shand confronts the two shady American businessmen he has attempting to make a deal with throughout all the destruction and gives one of British cinema's greatest speeches. This is nothing, however, compared to what comes next - two whole minutes of silence as the camera focuses on Hoskins as he quietly accepts his fate; a masterclass in minimalist genius.

Which is your favourite Bob Hoskins role? Share your own picks below in the comments thread. Amazon.com: The Long Good Friday: Bob Hoskins, Helen Mirren, Pierce Brosnan, Kevin McNally, John Mackenzie: Movies & TV The Long Good Friday Unlimited Streaming with Amazon Prime Start your 30-day free trial to stream thousands of movies & TV shows included with Prime. Start your free trial See all buying options Customers Who Bought This Item Also Bought Page 1 of 1 Start over Page 1 of 1 This shopping feature will continue to load items. In order to navigate out of this carousel please use your heading shortcut key to navigate to the next or previous heading. Page 1 of 1 Start over Sponsored Products are advertisements for products sold by merchants on Amazon.com. When you click on a Sponsored Product ad, you will be taken to an Amazon detail page where you can learn more about the product and purchase it. To learn more about Amazon Sponsored Products, click here . Ad feedback Special Offers and Product Promotions Get a $75.00 statement credit after first Amazon.com purchase made with new Discover itÂ® card within 3 months. Terms and conditions apply. See offer for details. Apply now.

Editorial Reviews Entrepreneurial mob boss Harold Shand (Academy Award-nominee Bob Hoskins, Mona Lisa) runs an underworld empire but his dreams are much bigger. He and his sophisticated wife (Oscar-winner Helen Mirren, The Queen) aspire to partner with American mobsters to turn the barren docklands of London into a development for the upcoming Olympics. But their perfect plan begins to unravel when a string of deadly bombings leads Shand to the stunning realization that he is being targeted by the IRA. A bloody race to hold on to his crumbling schemes brings him to an explosive climax in this taut, riveting thriller. Special Features Format: Multiple Formats, AC-3, Color, Dolby, NTSC, Widescreen Language: English Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only. Read more about DVD formats.

) Aspect Ratio: 1.77:1 DVD Release Date: February 1, 2011 Run Time: 113 minutes on August 3, 2010 Format: Blu-ray Verified Purchase I have compared this with the UK release and there are several significant differences: This is 1.85:1 whereas the UK release is cropped to 1.66:1. The cover claims that is the original aspect ratio but I can find no evidence to support this. The American release also has subtitles - God knows who did them, but not a London Cockney for sure - and despite many errors they will be a great help to the hearing impaired. My UK copy had a prominent hum on the DTS-HD Master audio, (but not on the stereo track), but the US release seems fine. So far it is the US by a knock-out, but the UK has a decent range of extras including commentary and a really interesting "making of" doco. Why on earth they could not have done a decent job and got them all on the same disc baffles me but in the end I will watch this US release for the wider picture, the better audio and the subtitles.

It has also recently been on sale for $5.99, a real Christmas gift! Bob Hoskins: 'The Method? Living it out? Cobblers!' | Film | The Guardian Movies Bob Hoskins: 'The Method? Living it out? Cobblers!' For Bob Hoskins there is no 'curse of the actor'. You just go in, enjoy yourself and bosh - job done. The problem, he tells Simon Hattenstone, is knowing when to stop acting in real life 'Some of the characters I've played you can't take home to the wife and kids' ... Bob Hoskins. Photograph: Sarah Lee for the Guardian Thursday 2 August 2007 19.00 EDT First published on Thursday 2 August 2007 19.00 EDT Share on Messenger Close Bob Hoskins says he's still waiting to be found out. He hasn't got a clue what he's doing in this business. "I feel I'm the wrong name on the right list," he says. "Keep going, keep prodding, and nobody'll notice. When I told my relations I'm gonna be an actor, they said: 'Don't be fucking daft.

Forget it! You've got to be kidding, aintcha?'" He's got a point. A bullfrog of a man with a boxer's nose and a right gob on him, he's hardly your conventional lead. But he's been working for 40 years now, and in that time has created some of the most memorable characters in television and film - Arthur Parker, the frustrated songsheet salesman in Pennies from Heaven, Harold Shand, the psychotic gangster in The Long Good Friday, lovelorn George in Mona Lisa, the eye-popping private eye Eddie Valiant in Who Framed Roger Rabbit. He does hard bastard and soft bastard equally well. In his new film, Sparkle, he is playing one of his touching - and touched - softies. Not surprisingly, acting wasn't his first job - it came along by accident one evening in London in the late 1960s. Hoskins turned up with his mate for an audition at the old trade union theatre, the Unity. He was just there for a drink, it was his friend who wanted the part. Right, next, said the casting director, pointing to Hoskins.

Before he knew it, he found himself on the stage reading from the script of a play about a young thug. He got the lead, and that was that. He didn't have any training or theory behind him, but he was good at pretending to be other people. "There's two things I love about this business. One's acting and the other one's getting paid for it. The rest of it is a mystery to me. But I ain't got the faintest idea what the fuck is goin' on, you know. I've read Stanislavsky, and I thought, well, this is obvious." Ignorant sod that I am, I ask if he means the Method, as thesps like to call it. "Nah! Nah, that's Lee Strasberg, that's bollocks! Like how to look busy. It's just looking busy, impressing the boss. That's bollocks, going through all this cobblers. Living it out and all that. Bollocks. Total cobblers!" I think I know what you mean, I tell him - for example, with The Long Good Friday it's pointless killing a few people just to get into character. "Exactly!" he says.

"I'm out the door in a flash. Gone. Let's face it, some of the characters I've played you can't take home to the wife and kids." Hoskins grew up in Finsbury Park in north London, his father a lorry driver, his mother a nurse. He left school at 15. Was he as hard as he seems? "Naaaah. You don't end up with a face like this if you're hard, do ya? This comes from having too much mouth and nothing to back it up with. The nose has been broken so many times." Was he mouthy? "Oh yeah, plenty of courage. I'm the soppy sod who got up again." Hoskins in Who Framed Roger Rabbit. Photograph: Moviestore Collection/REX It was in the late 1970s and early 80s that he produced his most outstanding work, partly because he was more fussy with his choices, and partly because Britain was rich in writers and directors. On television, Dennis Potter mingled genres and explored the subconscious in ways that hadn't been seen before. Was he aware that Pennies from Heaven was special when he was making it? "Nah.

The thing was at the time the BBC were quite frightened of it. Whasisname, Piers Haggard, the director, asked me to take me clothes off - I come home, take me clothes off, put me pyjamas on and go to bed, about as sexy as a bag of Brussels sprouts. But he says, 'I want full frontal.' Well, Bill Cotton [then controller of BBC1] went fuckin' bananas. 'We can't have that,' he says, 'If you show Hoskins' cock on the television we will get letters of complaint.' Dennis, without a beat, says, 'No Bill, you'll get letters of sympathy.' Hahahahaha!" Hoskins roars. What happened to the golden age of TV drama? "Gawd knows. It's all fucking live television, isn't it? It's all bollocks. Living television is the cheapest way to make TV and the cheaper they make it, the more money for the executives." Hoskins is now 64, but has no plans to retire. The thing is, he says, an actor can be in an iron lung and you can still give him a part.

And now, with his age and status, he's enjoying himself more than ever. "You reach a point where the cameo is the governor. You go in there for a couple of weeks, you're paid a lot of money, everybody treats you like the crown jewels, you're in and out, and if the film's a load of shit, nobody blames you, y'knowwhadimean. It's wonderful." Maybe for you Bob, I say, but not always so wonderful for us. The cameos can frustrate the viewer, and unbalance a film. In Sparkle, for example, you wish he was in the film longer. He laughs off the criticism. "Always leave 'em wanting more, son!" Hoskins has always liked his money. He is probably better known these days for the irritating British Telecom campaign than for his movies. For years, people stopped him in the street and told him: "It's good to talk." He was paid a huge amount by BT, but was it worth it? "You're joking, intcha? I couldn't believe it. It was un-be-lie-va-ble." So little work, so much money. Of course, he'd do it again if he was asked.

"The worst thing that happened to me was Madonna getting stalked by a fella called Bob Hoskins, and I had fuckin' hundreds of people come up to me, and say 'It's good to stalk.' Bastards! Hahaha!" He accepts there have been flops, and films he's detested, but that's the nature of the game. "The worst thing I ever did? Super Mario Brothers. It was a fuckin' nightmare. The whole experience was a nightmare. It had a husband-and-wife team directing, whose arrogance had been mistaken for talent. After so many weeks their own agent told them to get off the set! Fuckin' nightmare. Fuckin' idiots." Hoskins insists that acting is about having a good time, getting paid, getting home and getting the role out of his head. Bosh. The one time he found this difficult was playing Hilditch, the sex abuser, in Atom Egoyan's Felicia's Journey. "I'd finished and two weeks later Linda [his wife] said to me, 'Bob, you do realise you are behaving very strangely at the moment.' I went fuccccccck! Had a triple flush." Was he aware of it? "No." Had he gone quiet?

"Very quiet." Hoskins in The Long Good Friday. Photograph: Everett Collection/Rex Dig a little deeper, and you begin to realise that his attitude to acting is not quite so glib after all. His father recently died, and this was when he truly realised that acting is anything but a nine-to-five job - that it is more deeply rooted in his psyche than he'd like to admit. For the first time all afternoon, he talks quietly - about his love for his dad, how he drove him round Regent's Park when he was dying because that's all his dad wanted to do. "He didn't want to look at the roses or have a cup of tea or anything, he just wanted to be driven around. The police stopped us a few times and said what are you doing, and I said I'm driving him around ..." When his dad finally died, he was bereft, but left with a horrible numbness. "People talk of the curse of the actor ..." He stops and starts again. "Acting is like therapy, expressing the most extreme emotions and passions that a human being's capable of.

Then inevitably tragedy hits your own life, and all your family and friends gather round quite sincerely and openly show their pain, share their grief and comfort each other. "But you immediately click into acting mode, and you know that you're fucking acting." He sounds distraught as he tries to explain the emotional vacuum. "You just can't help going into it, and it's dishonest. It is really fucking dishonest. You're starting to act, not expressing yourself properly. So you close down, and then you wind up on the outside. So fucking lonely. People cry, and you start doing that and you know it's a technique, this is bullshit. It really struck home." Has he been able to get beyond this yet? "No, not yet. The point is you're stuck with it. I've still got it. It's still there. It's like a big fucking knot in there. I've got no way of expressing it." Big bollocksy Bob Hoskins now seems so small and vulnerable - and all the more likeble for it. He once said acting had saved his life. I ask him what he meant. "Well, it's given me everything I've ever wanted.

It's given me a job that gives me a buzz, it's paid me a fortune, I live the life of a rich man, it's given me a chance to educate my kids, given them the education I never had." What does he think would have happened to him if he'd not become an actor? "Probably rob banks or something." He pauses. "I'd probably be dead." · Sparkle is released on August 17 Mark Lawson: From the adult literacy series On the Move, through to classy literary adaptations, via the odd dodgy geezer or two, the late actor's small-screen career shares the qualities of his best film work Published: 1 May 2014 Actor and director Dexter Fletcher pays tribute to the much-loved star, who died on Wednesday, aged 71 Published: 3 May 2014 Letters: On set, Bob Hoskins was enormous fun. He called me 'sunshine'.

He called everyone, male or female, 'girls' Published: 1 May 2014 Elaine Cassidy, Hoskins' co-star in Felicia's Journey, has paid tribute to the late actor, while Hoskins' daughter posts online 11 life lessons from her father Published: 1 May 2014 The Long Good Friday by John MacKenzie |Bob Hoskins, Helen Mirren, Eddie Constantine | 14381657623 | DVD | Barnes & Noble® Videos Overview John Mackenzie's masterfully directed British crime drama features a star-making performance by Bob Hoskins as Harold Shand, a successful London gangster whose world falls apart over the course of one weekend. Shand controls the London docks and is planning a big real estate deal, financed by money from the American mob and given the okay by the London organization. His world is sweet -- he lives in a fancy penthouse, he owns a yacht, and has a sensitive and intelligent mistress. But suddenly a bomb explodes inside his Rolls Royce, another bomb destroys a pub he owns, and a third is found inside his casino.

Shand can't understand who would suddenly want him dead, particularly over the Easter weekend, when representatives from the American mafia are coming into town to discuss investing in Shands's real estate project. Advertising Editorial Reviews Barnes & Noble - Ed Hulse This British gangster movie might not enjoy the historical status of Little Caesar or Public Enemy, but it's a brilliant update of genre conventions distinguished by the star-making performance of Bob Hoskins . Best known as a character actor, Hoskins has demonstrated more than once his ability to carry a film: this one, he picks up and runs with. He's perfectly cast as Friday's protagonist, a highly entrepreneurial mobster named Harold Shand. Although a volatile sociopath, he enjoys relationships with British politicos and legitimate businessmen, and is on the verge of cobbling together a deal that will unite the English and American underworld in a massive London waterfront development. On the verge of this triumph, though, he finds himself locked in a bloody turf war that threatens to decimate his criminal empire. Hoskins, who looks every bit the ferocious bulldog he plays here, makes Harold a modern-day Macbeth, intoxicated by power but surrounded by deceit and treachery.

Helen Mirren is superb as his ambitious "moll," and veteran actors Eddie Constantine , Bryan Marshall , and George Coulouris lend excellent support. There's also a nice bit featuring a young Pierce Brosnan as an IRA terrorist. Barrie Keeffe's script isn't always easy to follow, but John Mackenzie's assured direction keeps Friday barreling along. The film is frank and brutal, but it has the kind of raw power that compels viewer attention throughout. Despite years of gangster thrillers since its original 1980 theatrical release, The Long Good Friday remain among the most vital and energetic examples of the genre. All Movie Guide Critics loved this finely detailed gangster film, in which a then little-known British actor and director made their mark in international cinema. Director John MacKenzie had labored without much acclaim in film and television before his deft handling of this wry screenplay by Barrie Keefe. Bob Hoskins was a veteran, versatile actor in stage and screen roles who become better known in the United States for his 1988 lead role opposite a cartoon character in the partially animated spoof Who Framed Roger Rabbit?.

In The Long Good Friday, he played a dockyard crime boss whose empire crumbles in a series of mysterious bombings over Easter weekend. Richly plotted and thick with suspense, the film made Hoskins an international star and was one of the finest of many contemporary updates of the classic crime film genre. The Long Good Friday - Movies & TV on Google Play The Long Good Friday Item added to wishlist. Item removed from wishlist. You will receive an email when your movie becomes available. You will not be charged until it is released. ( 116) Synopsis In the late 1970s, Cockney crime boss Harold Shand (Bob Hoskins), a gangster trying to become a legitimate property mogul, has big plans to get the American Mafia to bankroll his transformation of a derelict area of London into the possible venue for a future Olympic Games. However, a series of bombings targets his empire on the very weekend the Americans are in town. Shand is convinced there is a traitor in his organization, and sets out to eliminate the rat in typically ruthless fashion. My review Has a shaky, peculiarly British charm that still makes it irresistible.

Variety Staff In many respects a conventional thriller set in London's underworld, The Long Good Friday is much more densely plotted and intelligently scripted than most such yarns. Geoff Andrew The admittedly well-constructed set pieces are all too often diminished in effect by the uninspired camera-work. Roger Ebert I have rarely seen a movie character so completely alive. Shand is an evil, cruel, sadistic man. But he's a mass of contradictions, and there are times when we understand him so completely we almost feel affectionate. Janet Maslin Though its plot contains much that's new, The Long Good Friday is a swift, sharp-edged gangster story in a classic mold. Ken Pudsey The long good friday A craçking tense thriller from start to finish,as usual Bob hoskings gives a superb performance as does the rest of the cast in this timeless crime masterpiece Critic reviews Full Review Variety Staff In many respects a conventional thriller set in London's underworld, The Long Good Friday is much more densely plotted and intelligently scripted than most such yarns. Full Review Roger Ebert I have rarely seen a movie character so completely alive. Shand is an evil, cruel, sadistic man.

But he's a mass of contradictions, and there are times when we understand him so completely we almost feel affectionate. Full Review Janet Maslin Though its plot contains much that's new, The Long Good Friday is a swift, sharp-edged gangster story in a classic mold. User reviews Ken Pudsey May 3, 2016 The long good friday A craçking tense thriller from start to finish,as usual Bob hoskings gives a superb performance as does the rest of the cast in this timeless crime masterpiece Full Review Phil Dean May 2, 2016 Properly the greatest gangster film This film is a classic. Whilst people will continue to rave about the Godfather (and while they should) this is the British equivalent. A must watch Matt Watts May 21, 2016 My people. Cor Blimey! Mark Anthony Furnell May 2, 2016 The best English gangster film ever , a must watch before you die John Smale August 14, 2016 Long good Friday Love watching this film bob Hoskins at his brilliant best Michel Kelly September 4, 2016 Classic British gangster movie, best of the lot.

Bob hoskins is legendary Andy Bailey September 17, 2016 Stone bonk classic - great scenes throughout - Bob Hoskins is brilliant ! malcolm sandford May 4, 2016 A fantastic gangster film with top class acting by all of the stars Lea Hudson April 29, 2016 Long good Friday Brilliant film well worth buying Lee Wilson October 29, 2016 Fantastic One of the greatest gangster films of all time!!

Linda Gorey April 21, 2016 THE LONG GOOD FRIDAY Fantastic Film ryan brophy October 9, 2016 Rio Rio Rio Rio Rio Rio top Yo Rio Rio too too yup yup Azazel 666 August 30, 2015 Fantastic film The Long Good Friday - Special Edition DVD Review by Joe Lozito on BigPictureBigSound The Long Good Friday - Special Edition DVD Review By Joe Lozito Expectations & Reactions: Before he played an ex-con in "Mona Lisa" and way before he played a Mario Brother in "Super Mario Bros.", Bob Hoskins was Harold Shand, the London crime boss who propels "The Long Good Friday" into the annals of great British gangster movies. I'd only seen "The Long Good Friday" once before in a grainy, chopped up TV print. Still, writer Barrie Keeffe's serpentine script and Bob Hoskins' ferocious performance shone through. The reverent and much-deserved DVD release from Anchor Bay Entertainment promised to return the film to its original vitality. It doesn't disappoint.

What makes "Friday" stand out isn't that it was the first (it's actually a return to Hollywood gangster films of the 50s as well as London's from the early 70s) it's that all the pieces fit together so well. Bob Hoskins is perfect as the volatile "H". Few portrayals of ganglords are so textured and convincing. He's like Tony Soprano with a wicked accent. His Lady Macbeth is no typical gangster's moll, as played by Helen Mirren, Harry's ladylove is a true equal. The plot, meanwhile, is nearly incomprehensible, but it somehow holds together thanks to Mr. Keeffe's script and director John Mackenzie's urgent direction. The influence of Mr. Keeffe's tale of "terrorism meets gangsterism" was felt throughout the 80s in films like "The Hit" and "Storm Monday", but most recently in films such as "Sexy Beast" , "Layer Cake" and of course the oeuvre of Guy Ritchie. All feature gangland anti-heroes, circuitous plots, moments of extreme violence and of course that inimitable British patois. Like Mr.

Ritchie's films, "Friday" is brimming over with familiar faces. Look closely and you'll see Pierce Brosnan in his first feature film role as a silent assassin (credited as First Irishman). Paul Freeman (Belloq from "Raiders of the Lost Ark") is on hand in a memorable role. P.H. Moriarty (also featured in Mr. Ritchie's "Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels") stars as Harry's Oddjob-esque sidekick Razors. Alan Ford and Charles Cork, also Ritchie alumnae, appear in small but familiar roles. Look & Listen: Previously available in Widescreen only on an expensive Criterion Collection DVD (which was rather light on extras), this "Friday" also features a respectable 16x9 transfer to DVD. While the picture isn't as pristine as some Special Edition treatments, that actually works in its favor. "Friday", after all, takes place in London's underworld in 1979. Director John Mackenzie stages some memorable scenes (including a wonderful monologue on a boat under Tower Bridge) against backdrops which no longer exist, such as London's Docklands district long since replaced by Canary Wharf.

While the picture may be a little gray, it seems a fitting tribute to these wonderful locations. The memorable soundtrack by Francis Monkman is pumped up (almost to a fault) but sadly kept to a 2.0 stereo presentation. Extras & Highlights: The disc has some choice extras including a vivid commentary track from director John Mackenzie whose recall is startlingly detailed twenty-five years later. Particular gems include memories of prime London location shooting and a hysterical recount of the famous ending close-up of Mr. Hoskins which almost resulted in the director "killing the lot of us". Much is made of a filmed-then-scrapped opening montage which tracked a suitcase of ill-gotten money on its way to London. Sadly, there's no sign of that or any other deleted scenes on the disc. There's a lovingly produced, hour-long retrospective featuring new interviews from Bob Hoskins, Helen Mirren and Pierce Brosnan, as well as Mr. Mackenzie. It turns out that the complicated script credited to Barrie Keeffe was the product of many rewrites, even donning a new title to turn attention away from the nationality of the main villains.

My favorite extra: a Cockney Slang Dictionary, featuring no less than ten words for "police" and five for "gun". The collectible booklet, which puts the film in context, and screenplay, included in DVD-ROM format, round out this above-average set of extras. Menus & Interface: Fairly standard stuff, but easily navigable. Storyline & Syllabus: On the eve of a prosperous deal with some American investors, London ganglord Harold Shand (Bob Hoskins) is besieged by a series of attacks on his friends, family and business. Aided by his loving moll Victoria (Helen Mirren) Harold rounds up the usual suspects, with violent flair, until he gets to the bottom of it all. See the full review on Big Picture Big Sound . Conclusions & Afterthoughts: "The Long Good Friday" is a must-see for any fan of either pre- ("Get Carter") or post-1980 ("Snatch", "Layer Cake") London gangster movies. The DVD Special Edition gives the film its due and should be a fine introduction for American audiences who may be less familiar with the film.

Even after twenty-five years, "Friday" is still a solid film and now it's presented on a solid DVD. DVD Features: ° Widescreen Presentation enhanced for 16 x 9 TVs ° Rating: R ° DVD Release Date: April 4, 2006 ° List Price: $19.98 Bob Hoskins, British actor who starred in ‘Who Framed Roger Rabbit,’ dies at 71 - The Washington Post Bob Hoskins, British actor who starred in ‘Who Framed Roger Rabbit,’ dies at 71 The inside track on Washington politics. Be the first to know about new stories from PowerPost. Sign up to follow, and we’ll e-mail you free updates as they’re published. You’ll receive free e-mail news updates each time a new story is published. You’re all set! By Adam Bernstein By Adam Bernstein April 30, 2014 Bob Hoskins, the squat, bullet-shaped British actor who brought commanding depth to tough-guy roles in films such as “The Long Good Friday” and won over American audiences in “Who Framed Roger Rabbit” as a detective whose leading lady is a voluptuous cartoon character, died April 29 at 71.

His family said the cause was pneumonia but released no other details. The actor had announced his retirement after being diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease in 2012. Mr. Hoskins’s stardom was perhaps unexpected, given his lesser-than-life physique. People magazine dubbed him “a fireplug with eyebrows.” He described himself as “5 foot 6 inches and cubic” with a face resembling “a squashed cabbage.” He had come late to acting, after a Cockney upbringing and a restless early life that included jobs as a chimney sweep, nightclub bouncer, circus fire-eater and fruit-picker on an Israeli kibbutz. He said he entered show business in the late 1960s by accident. He was drinking in a London bar where auditions for an amateur theater production took place upstairs. “You’re next,” someone shouted at him, and he tried out, spurred by many pints of beer. He got the leading role. “I fit into this business like a sore foot into a soft shoe,” he later told the London Daily Telegraph. “I was a completely untrained, ill-educated idiot. So I read Stanislavski, but I thought it was all so obvious. Same with Strasberg.

He just seemed to be saying look busy. Impress the boss. I soon realized actors are just entertainers, even the serious ones.” After a training period in repertory, he ascended to the London stage opposite stars including John Gielgud and John Mills. Mr. Hoskins developed a reputation as a scene-stealer in workingman roles, which led to his breakthrough as a Depression-era sheet-music salesman in the BBC-produced miniseries “Pennies From Heaven” (1978). The serial, based on Dennis Potter’s teleplay, combined kitchen-sink realism with fantasy sequences of actors breaking into song, lip-syncing 1930s tunes. In a production that was a marvel of risky imagination, Mr. Hoskins earned terrific reviews as the seedy, daydreaming Arthur Parker. “Pennies From Heaven” launched Mr. Hoskins into leading-­man parts in British films, often as Cockney gangland figures. In “The Long Good Friday” (1980), he played a ruthless London mob boss with a Caesar-like haircut and ambitions in real estate development. Critic Janet Maslin wrote in the New York Times that Mr.

Hoskins’s character, Harold Shand, “emerges as an unexpectedly captivating man, even in a movie that concentrates on his savagery.” “Not even a scene in which Harold suddenly attacks one of his underlings with a bottle costs him the audience’s sympathy,” Maslin added. “The outburst is vicious and frightening, but it’s as much of a shock to Harold as it is to the viewer.” In writer-director Neil Jordan’s romantic thriller “Mona Lisa” (1986), Mr. Hoskins earned an Academy Award nomination for his leading performance as another Cockney underworld figure. He played an ex-con who chauffeurs around a black prostitute (Cathy Tyson) and, as a gesture of his love, tries to find her missing drug-addict girlfriend. The film that propelled Mr. Hoskins to broad recognition in the United States was director Robert Zemeckis’s “Who Framed Roger Rabbit” (1988), which blended live action with animation and married the hard-boiled detective genre with Looney Tunes. Mr. Hoskins was a boozing detective who falls for Jessica Rabbit, a cartoon human of pneumatic proportions who can’t help but bewitch men .

“I’m not bad,” insists Jessica (voiced by Kathleen Turner). “I’m just drawn that way.” The movie was a commercial hit. Admitting that he was inspired by the Hollywood-sized paychecks, Mr. Hoskins accepted such parts as the pirate Smee in Steven Spielberg’s Peter Pan takeoff “Hook” (1991) and one of the title siblings in “Super Mario Bros.” (1993), based on the video game. He also played Cher’s romantic interest in “Mermaids” (1990), portrayed FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover in director Oliver Stone’s “Nixon” (1995) and appeared as himself in “Spice World” (1997), featuring the British singing group Spice Girls. One of Mr. Hoskins’s favorite anecdotes involved director Brian De Palma when he was casting the role of gangster Al Capone for “The Untouchables” (1987). De Palma flew Mr. Hoskins to Los Angeles and asked him to be a backup — in case Robert De Niro refused the part. When an agreement was reached with De Niro, De Palma sent Mr.

Hoskins a consolation prize of 20,000 British pounds. “I phoned him right away,” Mr. Hoskins recalled, “and said, ‘Brian, you got any other movies you don’t want me to be in, I’m your boy.’ ” Robert William Hoskins was born Oct. 26, 1942, in Bury St. Edmunds, England, and grew up in London, where his mother was a nursery school cook and his father was a bookkeeper. “My childhood was happy, but I was a rebellious kid,” he told the Los Angeles Times. “I was a teenager in the ’60s, when pop culture and American rock-and-roll were arriving in Britain in a big way, and I wanted to have a good time, so I quit school when I was 15. “My idea of a good time was sex and travel, so I bummed around the Middle East and wound up on a kibbutz in Israel,” he added. “I lasted there until they told me I had to join the army.” Mr. Hoskins, who endured periods of depression, was divorced from his first wife, Jane Livesey.

Survivors include his wife, Linda Banwell; two children from his first marriage, Alex and Sarah; and two children from his second marriage, Jack and Rosa. Mr. Hoskins portrayed Iago opposite Anthony Hopkins in the title role of Shakespeare’s “Othello” for a 1981 BBC-TV production. Onscreen, Mr. Hoskins also played a mobster in director Francis Ford Coppola’s “The Cotton Club” (1984); a sinister plumber in Terry Gilliam’s dystopian fantasy “Brazil” (1985); a vulgar Hollywood screenwriter in “Sweet Liberty” (1986); and a man of questionable motive who romances an alcoholic spinster (Maggie Smith) in “The Lonely Passion of Judith Hearne” (1987). Mr. Hoskins returned to a more brutal role with “Unleashed” (2005), a film with action star Jet Li.

But mostly he was known in his later career for a series of well-shaded character parts in movies such as “Twenty Four Seven” (1997), in which he played a boxing coach, and “Last Orders” (2001), based on Graham Swift’s Booker Prize-winning novel, in which he was one of the working-class mourners who plan to scatter their friend’s ashes. “I don’t want to lose the street, because that’s what I act from,” Mr. Hoskins told People magazine. “A real performance is as much a shock to the system as a road accident. Every job that comes up, I love. It’s bleedin’ maavelous!” entertainment The Long Good Friday, film review - Telegraph The Long Good Friday, film review Bob Hoskins was superb in the 1980 crime thriller The Long Good Friday Bob Hoskins in The Long Good Friday Photo: Rex Features By Marc Lee 2:23PM BST 30 Apr 2014 The Long Good Friday (1980). Directed by John Mackenzie. Starring Bob Hoskins, Helen Mirren, Dave King, Bryan Marshall, Derek Thompson, Eddie Constantine, Paul Freeman and Leo Dolan.

The Long Good Friday is so firmly embedded in the era in which it was made that it is impossible to imagine it any other way. The burgeoning of Thatcherite Britain, the dawn of the greed-is-good Eighties and the transformation of London's docklands are not merely a backdrop; they define everything about the story of underworld boss Harold Shand's ambitious plans for a multi-million-pound property deal. Harold has invited his American backers – actually the Mafia – to see for themselves the vast potential of redeveloping the deserted wastes of east London. However, just as he launches his charm offensive, Harold's empire comes under attack from a mysterious, unseen enemy. An associate is knifed at a swimming pool, a bomb destroys his Rolls-Royce, and, in the film's most spectacular scene, his East End pub is blown up seconds before he arrives with his new best friends. Harold despatches his knuckle-headed and heavily tooled-up gang to discover what's going on – with a hilarious plea for them to "be discreet". When the usual suspects are rounded up, Harold has them hung upside-down from a line of meathooks to ease the interrogation. Related Articles

Question: Bob Hoskins played crime boss Harold Shand in which film?
Answer: The Long Good Friday